Veterans drop the ball in bad Ducks loss

ANAHEIM -- The Ducks have had to deal with the growing pains of its young players in working more of them into the everyday lineup this season.

But Coach Bruce Boudreau made it clear that the youngsters weren't the issue in their 5-2 loss to Vancouver on Thursday night.

"I think it was the veteran guys that created a lot of the mistakes tonight," Boudreau said. "It wasn't the kids. I thought they brought a lot of energy and a lot of good things to the table. I just think we need more on a night in night out basis from the top two lines."

The third line of Nick Bonino, Matt Beleskey and Andrew Gordon was rewarded with power-play time late in the third after they combined on Bonino's goal. But the more noticeable change was captain Ryan Getzlaf not getting any time on either of the Ducks' two third-period man-advantage situations.

"Well, the other guys weren't getting it done," Boudreau said. "And these guys were working their tail off. It's more of a reward for them. Maybe it was a little message to say, 'Listen, hey you guys aren't going to do it. We'll get somebody that's hopefully going to do it."

Toni Lydman also had a night to forget. Lydman lost the puck to Alex Burrows early on which ultimately resulted in Henrik Sedin's goal and was exploited by Cody Hodgson on the Canucks's second tally.

When asked about what he's seen from Lydman thus far, Boudreau said, "Up and down. I thought there's a lot of times he's really good. And there's times like tonight, I thought the first goals were direct faults of his. You don't expect that from veteran guys."

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